The opening of Matthew 16 smacks us in the face with irony if we allow it. The Pharisees and Sadducees came to Jesus asking him to show them a sign from heaven. We can easily get lost in Jesus’ suave reply and miss the bitter irony of the opening of this chapter. It is in the verses just preceding chapter 16 where Jesus feeds four thousand. Hello!? There’s your sign! Now, perhaps the Pharisees and Sadducees happened to not be at that event, but surely it was all the talk of the countryside. Surely, they had heard what had happened.
It seems to me that Matthew is using a quite effective device in crafting these stories together. How I have prayed for God to give me a sign - if he would only make this pencil fall off my desk right now as I type. Then I would know that there is a God and he would finally and completely put my doubts at rest. Jesus reminds us in another place that those who do not believe will be “ever seeing, but never perceiving.” Take a moment today and look for the signs that are all around. Stop talking so much and listen to the voice of God.
Right after his exchange with the Pharisees and Sadducees, it is the disciples who are misguided, still not “getting” the bigger picture. They slow down and think. They consider and... “Oh...” then they get it. It is difficult to imagine what Jesus’ life would have looked like in our day and age, but certainly one of his chief goals would have been to get us all to slow down and to be still and know that the Lord is God.
12 I must go on boasting. Although there is nothing to be gained, I will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord. 2 I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know—God knows. 3 And I know that this man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows— 4 was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell. 5 I will boast about a man like that, but I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. 6 Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the truth. But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say, 7 or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.